| Infographic: Should we pay to use social media? | | 05 March 2014, 12:30PM | 
How attached are you to Facebook? Do you really need your Twitter account? Would its absence from your life leave such a gaping hole you pay cold hard cash to keep it safe? As social media sites look for ways to make a profit we users find ourselves stuck between a panicky rock and an indifferent hard place. Advertisers target our personal information and profiles. Mark yourself as single and suddenly dating sites are everywhere, write 'Drunk on whisky, lol' and a famous grouse follows you. It's draining, loud and depressing.
| | | | Direct response is dead... long live direct response! | | 05 March 2014, 12:15PM |  Described by David Ogilvy over 40 years ago as the 'secret weapon' of advertising, the term direct response was coined to describe a range of marketing techniques that were designed to sell products and services, rather than those that just affected awareness or consideration. It was proven that long copy ads drove more sales than those with short copy; those with a compelling offer were more effective than those without. As the tricks of the trade became more advanced, marketers came to become more and more reliant on direct response to drive consumer behaviours that actually affected the bottom line.
| | | | Why follower retention is a clear indicator of success or failure on Twitter | | 05 March 2014, 12:10PM |  Social media managers spend a lot of time agonising over how to increase their Twitter following. It takes a lot of energy to keep doing creative things, week after week, yet many brands neglect to nurture relationships with those hard won followers. Indeed, our research shows that without early engagement, companies can expect to lose 15 per cent of new followers within three weeks, hampering community growth over the long term.
| | | | Even Jack Ryan can't save some brands when product placement goes wrong | | 05 March 2014, 1:08AM |  Product placements in films are one of those things that can work extremely well or make your brand look very foolish. There is no shortage of films with product placement in them at the moment. Some are very obvious and clunky and some are very cool and in keeping with the story and film brand.
| | | | How experiential will become a new form of market research | | 04 March 2014, 10:33AM |  Everyone loves a freebie. It doesn't matter how old you are, how wealthy you are. Whatever your job title, if there's a freebie up for grabs then you're automatically interested. For this reason, I'm baffled why many brands are still struggling when it comes to customer data.
| | | | How do businesses sell to 'Generation Free'? | | 04 March 2014, 10:19AM |  If you are under the age of 18, you have probably never bought a CD, sent a letter in the post or rented a DVD. Why would you? Technology has made these things almost obsolete. Generation Z (broadly anyone born post 2000) have been lucky in their avoidance of a number of tasks that in hindsight were a real waste of time for us oldies. Venturing out on a cold Sunday evening to fetch a DVD from Blockbusters looks positively archaic in 2014. As well as saving us time, technical innovation has saved us money. With power continuing to shift from business to individual, barriers to entry are eroded and the true marginal cost of a product has been exposed in an increasing number of categories.
A great example of this is WhatsApp, probably the hottest thing in technology at the moment and with good reason.
| | | | Music and fashion, a relationship made to last | | 04 March 2014, 10:11AM |  Fashion and music have always walked hand in hand, with musicians often being the driving force behind the latest fashion trends. From something as simple as a band t-shirt to a more immersive association with punk or hip hop culture, fashion and music are inseparably intertwined as a means of self-expression for the sub-cultures of society.
Recent statistics from PRS revealed that the UK music industry attracted over £100 million in investments from big brands in 2013. Connecting with consumers using their love of music is a tactic loved by marketers and is used to create a deeper and memorable experience with a product or brand.
| | | | Small screen, big opportunity: capitalising on consumers' nomophobia | | 03 March 2014, 1:00PM |  Nomophobia. Over half of us have experienced it: the fear of losing mobile signal, running out of battery or losing sight of your phone. That a name has been coined for this condition is perhaps a more telling sign about the role of mobiles than how many people will admit to experiencing it. Over the course of the last 10-15 years, the mobile has gone from a simple portable phone to being as indispensable as your keys and wallet.
| | | | The scary thing is, our autopilot is terrible at strategy | | 03 March 2014, 11:25AM |  Everyone with a passing interest in behavioural science knows that we humans make most of our decisions using our ‘autopilot’, which bypasses our need to think too much about what we’re doing. In marketing strategy, we need to be wary of our autopilot in order to make good long-term decisions for our clients. In social marketing strategy, we need to be more than just aware of our autopilot – we need to be damn right afraid of its influence over our decision-making!
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